Procter buying rest of Agrolimen joint venture for $1 billion

(Reuters) - Procter & Gamble Co (PG.N) said on Friday it is buying the rest of its joint venture with Spain's Agrolimen Group for $1 billion, a move that expands its presence in the European feminine care and diaper businesses.

P&G, the world's largest household products maker, has a 50 percent stake in the joint venture, known as Arbora & Ausonia. Agrolimen exercised a put option to sell the remaining 50 percent to P&G, the Cincinnati-based company said on Friday.

"While we have valued the partnership with Agrolimen, we entered into a put arrangement because we saw benefits to drive innovation and scale benefits with a 100 percent ownership interest in this business," P&G said in a statement.

The joint venture dates back to the late 1980s or early 1990s, P&G said.

P&G, which makes Pampers diapers, Tampax tampons and Always feminine care pads, expects the deal to close by the end of 2012. Barcelona-based Agrolimen continues to operate in businesses such as food.

Arbora & Ausonia has offices in Spain and Portugal and sells products such as Dodot diapers and Kandoo wipes for children.

The purchase comes soon after P&G announced plans to focus on key, large businesses, and after activist investor William Ackman's Pershing Square Capital Management took a roughly 1 percent stake in P&G.

Ackman hasn't said what changes, if any, he would like to see at P&G, which is in the midst of a $10 billion restructuring.

P&G opened down 0.2 percent to $64.79.

(Reporting by Jessica Wohl in Chicago; editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)